


Happens All The Time

by RS_Games



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Action/Adventure, Canon Compliant, First War with Voldemort, Getting Together, M/M, Time Shenanigans
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-10-24
Updated: 2017-10-24
Packaged: 2019-01-21 17:19:09
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 10,716
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12462336
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/RS_Games/pseuds/RS_Games
Summary: R/S Games 2017 - Day 20 - Team SiriusSirius and Remus experiment with Time magic, but things go awry when it falls into the wrong hands.(byaccio-punk)





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> **Team:** Sirius  
>  **Title:** Happens All The Time  
>  **Rating:** T  
>  **Warnings:** None  
>  **Genres:** Action/Adventure, Canon-compliant  
>  **Word Count:** 11,000  
>  **Summary:** Sirius and Remus experiment with Time magic, but things go awry when it falls into the wrong hands.  
>  **Notes:** Set in Sept 1979. The Embassy opened in 1978, inspired by the NY gay scene, which opened up more room for drugs and flamboyance in the London scene. Most of the gay clubs referenced here are smaller venues, inspired by clubs such as Louise’s and The Roxy, though not entirely and the extent of drug use as such may be anachronistic.  
>  **Prompt:** #24 - “When I was fifteen, all I wanted was to go off to some other world, a place beyond anybody’s reach. A place beyond the flow of time.  
>  \- But there’s no place like that in this world.  
> \- Exactly. Which is why I’m living here, in this world where things are continually damaged, where the heart is fickle, where time flows past without a break.”  
> \- excerpt from the novel _Kafka on the Shore_ by Haruki Murakami

It was born from the perfect mixture of bills, desperation, and coffee. It had been that way for days; long nights chased by stress and worry of making rent. If Sirius was honest, it had been like that for months. Between his auror training and Remus’ fleeting jobs, not to mention spending half their time on Order missions, they were barely scraping enough to get by, let alone make rent. This war was gonna starve them out long before it killed them in combat, Sirius had begun to think.  
They were both sat round the kitchen table. Remus had just got in from his shift at the bar and the 3am close showed under his eyes. Sirius was similarly dishevelled, having stayed up all night trying to work out a solution. The man was running on caffeine.  
Night-time has a way of pulling one into their actions. Sirius felt as if he were operating his body from afar. His hands ran over his face; pulled at his hair. His thoughts reverberated through the silence of the kitchen and crashed like painful giants on his ear drums. At the sink, the tap was dripping.  
“We’re not gonna make rent.” Sirius had said before Remus went to work, as if this was news. They hadn't made rent in three months. Next Friday they would be evicted.  
“Where do we go from here?” Remus had asked. Sirius knew he didn't expect an answer - it was a familiar script to follow.  
They already shared a dingy flat in muggle London, living off beans and whatever scraps they could pull. How do you tighten your purse strings when they’re already gripped around your throat? Merlin, Sirius had fallen so far from his aristocratic graces.  
But now; now in the kitchen with the yellow light and the tired eyes and the dripping tap Sirius thought he had an answer.  
“We’re going to sell time,” he said.  
Remus didn’t even reply. He just blinked, hard.  
“Physical time. I think we can make it. And sell it,” Sirius said.  
“How?”  
“Not sure about technicalities, but we have that broken time turner.”  
“Oh yeah. Yeah. we can definitely figure that out”  
“God knows we invented enough spells for the map”  
“Exactly!” Remus paused. “Is it legal?”  
“I dunno. If we’re pioneering it, it can’t be that illegal yet.”  
“Fuck it, that’s good enough for me.”  
They grinned at each other and they were schoolboys again.  
“Where do we start?” asked Sirius  
“Coffee.”

Three cups of coffee do wonders to a man. Especially downed in succession by men running on little food and lesser sleep. Sirius was acutely aware that they were crossing over from tiredness to exhausted hyperactivity and he didn’t much care. They bounced around the kitchen wildly; moving not much more than normally but their energy slamming into every available surface like a shotgun ricochet.  
The kitchen was a mess of spell books and parchment and quills and paper and biros (“they’re cheaper and easier to use, Sirius, fight me”) and shards of the old time turner suspended in various positions and charms. It was a hectic mess of magical ambition. A kitchen reflects its masters. It was glorious.  
They were each following different tangents. Moony was researching how time turners even worked, and the lack of concrete explanation lead to the scientific experiments done on their specimen time turner. Some of the shards were glowing softly green and pink, some were shaking violently, and at least one had developed a questionable relationship with the physical realm. That one was by far Sirius’ favourite, and happened to be the one Remus thought most promising. Sirius was experimenting with spells and runes. He figured that if you combined the right magics together, something good would happen. So far that something was mostly explosions. It took days before those explosions became anything useful.  
In the end, Sirius set the runes and layered up charms while Remus did the complex spell work on top of it. Arithmancy was the secret, he told Sirius, as if either of them had truly valued it back in school. If they messed up the timing even slightly, Sirius discovered, your eyebrows became domain of the time gods. But now, on this Sunday morning washed grey by murky light and tiny windows, they got it right. Somehow. Well, to be totally honest, it was less of a mystery and more a credit to Moony’s talent.  
But they’d done it.  
“We’ve done it!” Sirius whooped. Moony grinned back at him. The way he laughed lit up his whole face. He had an uncanny ability to change the tone of a room - his smile could make a drab, milky light seem ethereal. And when he clapped his hand on Sirius’ back and pulled him into a hug, Sirius felt their ecstasy as a physical thing. Maybe they had a knack for turning concepts plastic. Either way, pressed against his best friend for however brief a moment everything was pure.

***

“You ready?” It was the next day. They were sat on the floor in the space between their sofa and coffee table, something they did often for no particular reason.  
“Uhh, yeah.”  
“Right.” Sirius watched as Remus used his wand to cut time. Time, as something more than a concept, was iridescent and shimmery. It obeyed the opposite mechanics to the figures one sees in the corner of their eyes; it only seems fully corporeal when directly focused on. Anything less and it would forget itself until looked at once more. When Remus handed him a thin sliver, it left a silky residue on his fingers. Oddly light, like a mousse but almost powdery.  
“I’ll spot you,” Remus said.  
“How should I take it?” Sirius asked.  
“Dunno. Just try something. I’ve given you about 2 minutes so it can’t go too badly wrong.”  
“Okay.” He swallowed it. Time was a slippery thing that dissolved almost before it had edged down his throat. The smell of ozone was stronger, so Sirius was expecting a taste more acidic than his mother’s compliment, but he didn’t taste anything.  
“How long do you think it takes to kick in?” he asked. Remus didn’t respond how Sirius expected.  
“What the fuck?” was what he actually said, from the kitchen. Evidently, swallowing time lets you skip it. Remus said that as soon as he swallowed it, he kind of froze in place. “It was really freaky, actually, at first. Like you’d been petrified or something”. Staring at a frozen friend is boring after a while, so Moony had gone to make them both some tea. So much for spotting me, Sirius thought. The tea was welcome though.  
“You know,” Remus said. “The more I try to think about you being frozen, the less I can remember it. Like one of those dreams that slips as you think about it.”  
“Huh. Weird.”  
“Okay, my go,” Remus said after a while. He grabbed a small chunk - two minutes again - and crushed it into his palm. His hands were big. He had long fingers and tidy nails and they moved with the grace of a pianist despite never having so much as touched a piano. He averted his eyes, looking instead towards the sofa and, what the fuck? at Remus. What the fuck? He wasn’t there less than even a second ago. Oh. Well, he and Remus reacted the same to each other’s using, apparently.  
Remus laughed; fast and weirdly high pitched. “You have to try that.”  
Sirius felt like he’d been missing out on an unreasonable amount of time that morning. They both took it that time, though as soon as Sirius was done crushing it he could sense no difference.  
Nothing was happening.  
“Nothing is happening,” he said.  
“Exactly,” said Remus. He pointed to the clock on their kitchen which wasn’t ticking. In place of that noise was a strange hollowness as the bustle and the sirens and the cars that comprised the background of the strange play that their lives performed, disappeared. That was jarring.  
“Time’s stopped?” Sirius realised.  
“Mmhm,” Remus affirmed.  
“What if I-” Sirius picked up a mug from the coffee table. It was a yellow one James had bought Moony last Christmas. He dropped it. The mug stayed in place once leaving his hand; suspended at head height. Remus laughed at that, no doubt thinking about how the ugliest mug was blessed with a magical sparing from being smashed.  
“So, whatever we touch joins us in time?” Remus wasn’t really asking Sirius, he’d already gathered that much by the time he said it out loud.

They carried on all day to establish the rules of this magic through trial and error. Anything touching them would follow normal time, until it stopped touching them again. Living things were no exception. All items are just as heavy, because really, why the hell wouldn’t they be. Candles can be lit, but the flames freeze in place. That, Sirius thought, was rather marvellous.  
If they took much more than half an hour at a time, they were met with hellfire in headache form and furious vomiting at the other end. They only did that twice. Twice is enough to establish a connection. They never tried much more than that, because time has a way of crushing you if you ignore it.

In all their time, Remus never attempted to skip past the full moon. Sirius wouldn’t let him. They didn’t know the side effects of taking that much all at once, and besides, his body would still be there. Would the moon still affect his body without him in it? It wasn’t finding out. Sirius couldn't let him risk it.

***  
“James.”  
“Mhmm?”  
“Don’t freak out.”  
“Well that’s a great way of helping people stay calm,” he said. “What is it, though?”  
“I might be pregnant.” Well, shit. “Say something, babe,” she continued when James had been silent for longer than acceptable.  
“Uhhm. Shit. I, uhh. Are you sure?”  
“No, not at all. That’s why I said, ‘might be’.”  
James just raised his eyebrows at her.  
“I’m 10 days late.”  
“Ah. Merlin.”  
“I know.” they slumped down next to each other against the wall.  
“We’re not ready to be parents,” Lily said.  
James laughed. “God, no. Last week you burnt our clothes by drying them in the oven.”  
“And you put the toaster in the washing machine.”  
“We can’t look after a tiny human.”  
“It would be kinda cute, though. It could fly around the flat on a tiny broomstick.”  
“Babies do have cute hands,” she mused.  
“I guess it wouldn’t be the end of the world?”  
“No. We’ve got to find out for sure though.”

“Do you know any pregnancy spells?” he asked.  
“Nope. maybe someone we know might?”  
“What about Dorcas? She’s a healer.”  
“A military healer, James. She’s not gonna know pregnancy tests.”  
“She might.”  
“Not unless people have started projectile launching babies at Voldemort, she won’t.”  
They laughed.  
“What about a muggle pregnancy test? They have those, right?”  
“I mean, would that even work? Neither of us are muggles, would it detect a magic baby?”  
“It is still human, Lils. I think. Our kid can’t be pure magic, can it?”  
“We really should have pushed McGonagall to teach us biology past age 11, huh?”

***

Selling wasn’t something Sirius was particularly worried about. He’d never really dealt anything before, but he was well versed in the language of back alleys and implicit intentions. When he first moved in with Remus, he slunk the streets with fear on his face plain as a partridge. He felt so out of place that he belonged. The night was his guide to the sanctuaries of neon lights and sticky bars and music that drowned out his racing heart.  
He was more used to it, now. a creature of the city veins.  
Sirius waited outside the club for a moment before going in. He and Remus sold independently of each other, which Sirius was thankful for because it let him stake his usual haunts without question.  
The music here wasn’t really Sirius’ type; he preferred the smaller punk venues, but it was huge and packed full. It was built for dancing and people wanting to get off their tits, so kind of perfect. He pressed into the mass of dancers, most of whom were either dressed elaborately, or shirtless. Not much room for the in between. Clubs like this have the uncanny ability to separate a person from the reality of a world that hates them. Sirius felt someone press up to his back, hands on his hips, dancing with him. Sirius looked around. The guy was hot. Really hot. He smiled and nudged his face into the stranger’s neck for a moment and went back to dancing.  
The guy’s eyes were dilated, he saw later when he was facing him. Sirius asked if he wanted to try something choice and when he asked what it was, Sirius winked and said it was “better than whatever you’re on.”  
“Just rub it onto skin,” he told the man. It was okay, he reckoned, giving magic to muggles like this, because they’d just think they were tripping. Hard. Especially if they were high already.  
A second later the man whooped - eyes wide and wild - appearing on the other side of Sirius, who spun round to meet his gaze.  
“It’s called Time,” he said. “Tell your friends.”  
And he kissed the man like a glance on his lips, thinking briefly of pale skin and sandy hair.  
Sirius danced through the night, occasionally setting up camp in the dingy toilets, until he was out of shit. It was exhausting and exhilarating in equal measures. He loved the thrill of the deals and the feel of the underground world he’d become a part of. Sure, he was tired, but so it went on.

When he got home, he scribbled a note for Remus and left it on the kitchen table. It said, “wake me up before noon & ur dead.”

One time he got scared. It was cold outside in typical autumnal fashion but his cloak was thin. Wizards, this time. Sirius was in the mouth of an alleyway, making him the tongue of some foul beast which was probably the city. The guys he was selling to were bigger than him, which wasn't usually a problem, but there were two of them and they looked decidedly unhappy. And by unhappy, Sirius meant scathing.  
He hated pricks like this. They reminded him vaguely of his family and more like the dumb Slytherin assholes he’d get into fights with constantly at Hogwarts. Hell, these guys were so far up their own arses that they probably were Slytherins. Wormtail, and more recently James, figured that house traits didn’t run as irreparably deep as Sirius thought them, but they hadn’t grown up at the mercy of the pureblood ring. He knew what Slytherins were like.  
Their faces were covered and only their eyes were showing under their hoods. They didn’t appreciate Sirius’ comments about protecting the outside world from their faces.  
“Show us the shit first,” the taller one commanded, which pissed Sirius off.  
“Not until you hand over the money,” he told them. It was like 4 hours’ worth of Time, which translated to More-Money-Than-He-Could-Afford-To-Lose.  
“We ain’t handing over anything yet.”  
“look, mate,” Sirius said. “I’m the only supplier you can get this from. Take it or leave it but fuck off if y’int gonna pay me.”  
The shorter guy surged up to him, like a building wave. He still had a couple inches on Sirius, and used them to pin his neck against the wall with his forearm. Sirius tried to swear at him but managed only to splutter.  
“You wanna say that again,” short guy whispered. Sirius kneed him in the crotch and lept out his grip and then he was reeling in pain and momentum. The other guy punched him. He spat blood and threw a hex at him, but short guy was back and kicked out his legs. Sirius was bent over on the floor and the cobbles were cold as shit and his head hurt but not as much as his back when they kicked him again there and they kept kicking him until the ripped the time out the pouch on his sleeve and kicked him again for good measure.  
They guys left. Sirius’ heart was still racing. He lay on the ground for a bit longer. Good old ground; sturdy, dependable, always there to accommodate an impromptu lie-down.  
He’d have lost a lot of money if he hadn’t picked the guys pocket when he was pinned to the wall. Was it worth it? Absolutely not. He hurt like shit and he wasn’t great at doing healing charms on himself.  
Remus would fix him when he got home.

Largely, though, the dealing was going really well. Two weeks in, and they’d already run out of gear. They were selling it to wizards and muggles alike, but wizards were better business because they knew they were buying something more significant than a high. The prices were extortionate, but irreplaceable spells left no competition. Sirius assumed he’d be more accustomed to dealing; used to sneaking around to avoid the consequences of Section 28, but Remus turned out to be just as good. Unsurprising, really: Moony’s good at everything.  
Secretly, he doubted how well their business would do, but people still came. Because time is money and money is everything.


	2. Chapter 2

Saturday morning came as it always did. Sirius was folded up on the sofa, frowning at his impossible crossword. No birds were chirping because they gave up on that in the small hours so no one could ever hear their song and feel joy from it. James sang Sirius’ name though, as he stumbled through the fireplace.  
“Prongs!” He moved to hug his best mate.  
“Alright Pads?” James asked.  
“Yeah, not bad.” That wasn’t far from the truth. “You?”  
“Spunky as ever.”  
“Piss off. That’s good, though.”  
James laughed. “Where’s moony?”  
“In the shower.” Sirius stood up and beat his fist against the wall. “Oi, Moony! Prongs is here.”  
“I’ll be out in a second,” came the muffled reply. The sound of rushing water shut off almost instantly. It was replaced by a harmonious dripping that signalled some sort of water damage from the leaky pipes that they were determined to ignore.  
“Tea?” Sirius asked James. A flick of his wand, and teabags were flying around the kitchen before James had even confirmed. So much was the nature of their relationship: fast, flying, and assumed.  
By the time Remus joined them - still wet hair dripping lazily down his shirtless chest - they were finishing plans for their night out. He and prongs exchanged grins by way of greeting. Sirius pressed a mug into his hand, and he took a few grateful gulps. His Adam’s apple bobbed the line of his throat and Sirius wandered how someone could make a cup of coffee look so ethereal. James seemed to be frowning at Moony’s shirtless figure. It wasn’t that he had a problem with the partial nudity, having shared a dorm for seven years thoroughly desensitised them all to each other’s stages of undress. No, it was something else.  
“You’ve lost weight,” he said.  
Remus just shrugged. “We both have.”  
James didn't press it, probably going off his experience dealing with Sirius and Remus’ feelings towards borrowing money. Or taking money. Or accepting most forms of aid in any way.  
“We’ve sorted it now though,” Sirius said.  
“Yeah, right,” said Remus. “So, you come to sort out the pub tonight? It’s been ages since we’ve all got together.”  
“Err, actually, I came to talk to you, Remus.” James scratched his neck, and looked pointedly at Sirius.  
“I’ll, uh, go wait in the other room. I guess? Yeah,” he said.

Even with the door shut behind him, Sirius knew he’d be able to hear everything said in the kitchen. All the walls in this flat were painfully thin. S’pose if they really cared about him not hearing, they’d cast a silencing spell. He settled for staring intently at the crossword and politely denying any eavesdropping if asked.  
“I came pretty much straight from the order. Figured you’d wanna hear it from me ‘stead of the prophet,” James was saying.  
“What is it?” Remus asked.  
“Mark Cunningham died; last week, in a raid. They got his family too.”  
Mark Cunningham? The Ravenclaw from the year above? Sirius had no clue why James would want to break that news to Remus in private. They did study together; more interaction than the rest of them had with him, but it hardly warranted this supposed secrecy.  
But then Remus sniffed loudly, and Sirius realised he must be crying. Confused as he was, all Sirius wanted in that moment was to hug him. James would be comforting him, but still. He wanted to help.  
“Sorry.” Remus’ voice shook.  
“It’s okay,” said James.  
“I know it’s stupid but, just -ugh,” he sighed and sniffed again.  
“It’s hardly stupid, mate. You were together for years. That’s not nothing.”  
What was James talking about?  
“Mhm, exactly. He was my first boyfriend,” Moony’s voice began to crack. “He can't be dead”  
Oh. Oh.  
They were quiet for a while. A charged quiet that worked its way throughout the flat and into the knots in Sirius’ back and the lines in his forehead. His heart ached for them. He couldn’t imagine the feeling of losing a long-term ex, partially because he’d never dated, well, anyone. (Sure, he’d had Things here and there, but never a relationship: much less long term.) Must hurt like a bitch, he reck’d.  
Remus had had a boyfriend though. Remus. How come Sirius never thought he could be gay? Was his gaydar that far out? Mark Cunningham, though. Sirius may have had a crush on him back in Hogwarts. Really, it was impossible not to, seeing him in that tight Quidditch uniform. He and Remus did spend a lot of time studying together. Or not studying, rather. Merlin. Sirius’ head was too light and he wasn’t quite sure why.

Bother their eyes were red when they came into the living room but neither one was crying. By the time James went home they seemed next to normal.  
“Hey Moony,” Sirius said in the wake of James’ departure. “I’m sorry.”  
“You heard?” Remus looked at him and he nodded. “I figured you would.”  
“Are you okay?”  
“Yeah, I think so. I mean there’s a war on; people are dying all around us. It’s just weird, you know?”  
Sirius did know. Every day they recognised another name in the obituaries. They were young and full of life and so had been their friends that now lay cold and it was far too much to process. He figured it was one of those things that would slam down on them when the war ended, but for now passed over like a storm.  
Even later, Sirius couldn't stop thinking about it. He came up to Remus when he was cooking tea.  
“So, you're gay,” he said, aiming for casual and missing the mark like an iron arrow.  
“Yes,” Remus said.  
“You never told me.”  
Remus shrugged slightly too nonchalantly. “Never came up.”  
“Fuck off, it never came up? We’ve lived together since we were eleven.”  
And Remus said, very slowly, “Do you have a problem with that?”  
“No, obviously not!” Sirius’ voice was creeping up. Remus matched it.  
“Then the fuck d’you care so much?”  
“Because you told James that you’re gay, and not me.” As always, Sirius choked out the word gay, unable to break a fear stained tradition of 19 years. Remus noticed - of course Remus noticed - and his face turned instantly and his words froze over. Without context, internalised homophobia comes out as regular, store-brand homophobia.  
“I don’t owe you coming out, Sirius.”  
“I’m your best friend, though, and you never thought to tell me?” Sirius was making it about himself. He meant to be supportive, or caring, or come out too: anything but this. And yet, like always, he was fucking it up.  
“Christ, Sirius.” Remus grabbed his food and made to leave, stopping in the doorway to look Sirius in the eyes. “Me being gay has absolutely nothing to do with you.”

And that, thought Sirius, is Exactly the problem.

***

The trees obviously weren't causing the rain but they bloody felt like it as they dumped more water onto Sirius’ head every time the leaves shook. rain was hideously strong and nature offered only limited shelter from the elements. They were on a recon mission for the order, though the barn they were watching seemed only to be a den of intense inactivity. He huddled closer to Remus for warmth, and Remus subtly rearranged himself to accommodate. He smelt warm and good. It was 10:37 and they still had almost three hours to go.  
They were caught between wanting something to happen, and wishing to death that nothing would. If things got bad, they’d have to fight without backup. If things stayed still, three hours would seep the heat from their bones and the life from their fingers. The warming charms weren’t sticking.  
Sirius flicked his lighter and held it close to his face for warmth. He thought maybe Remus would have a go for risking their cover but he seemed to have faith that their glamour would hold better than the heat.  
“Fag?” he asked, pulling a rolly out of his lapel pocket.  
“Mh, wait, I’ve got a straight on me,” Sirius said and handed it to Remus. He’d only brought one in case they got soaked, so they’d have to share.  
Remus held it between his lips - which were cherry red from the cold - and leant forward. Sirius choked a little, before cupping the fag to light it. Doing it the muggle way felt better. Remus had given him his first lighter, way before they’d ever started smoking. They hadn’t known how to do fire charms yet, so Moony gave them all lighters when he came back from half term. That was the first time they set their dorm on fire.  
Remus took a long drag, and passed it to Sirius. They smoked in silence for a while. Remus had a habit of tilting his head up to blow out smoke. It exposed the long line of his throat and the moonlight struck his jawline. Remus breathed out and he tore the breath from Sirius’ lungs.

Nothing was happening in the barn. It wasn’t even lit. The only light was the moon but the heavy rain and clouds meant that there was no chance of moonlight at all.  
But Dumbledore told them to watch the barn. And what Dumbledore said, the order did.  
A rat scuttled in and straight out. Apparently, it had places to go, or maybe the shitty barn was somehow worse than exposure to the elements.  
Two hours to go. It was tempting to just skip the time, but then they’d miss something and the war was at stake. Probably.

“I, uh, I’m sorry. About how I acted. The other day,” Sirius said. He didn’t normally apologise. Not with words, anyway. Usually a hug or a head nudge. Words were difficult.  
“It’s okay,” Remus said. It wasn’t, but Sirius wasn’t going to say that.  
“No, I uh. I just acted strangely because, um,” he paused. “I felt left out of the group.”  
That wasn’t what he was going to say. He’d never actually said what he was going to say. This was true, too, though. A different truth is not a lie. Not really.  
“I told James in fifth year after he kept interrupting my dates accidentally. It was nothing personal. Pete doesn’t know either.”  
“He was interrupting dates?”  
Remus laughed. “Yeah, god. I had to proper sit him down and everything.”  
“Ha!”  
“It was so awkward, but after like the fourth time he’d started chatting with the guy I was trying to get with I had to do something.”  
When they were laughing, the cold didn't feel quite so oppressive and the rain wasn’t targeted at them specifically.  
“Were there lots of gay guys at Hogwarts?” Sirius asked. He hadn’t had his first kiss until after leaving.  
Remus made a noise. “A few. Not loads.”  
“I never knew.”  
“Don’t think many people did.”  
Sirius knew all was forgiven from the other night. Realistically, he knew all was forgiven even hours after, but still. He leaned in close to Moony’s warmth.

One hour ‘til they could go home.

 

***

Rain lashed against the window panes and Sirius was glad to finally be home and dry. Auror training had run late, as if running drills in the pouring rain wasn’t bad enough. He was on the sofa sipping hot chocolate, because it was late enough that he could wait up for Remus to come home without much effort. They did that sometimes, usually one would wait for the other after Order missions, because sleeping alone after a bad one can be just too much to bare. Moony was late, though.

Sirius heard some talking from the hall, and then Remus threw the door open, with a guy on his arm. They giggled at something softly and walked halfway to Remus' room before noticing Sirius  
"Sirius, what are you doing up?" Remus asked. He looked concerned in an over-animated way and expressions of the like usually meant he'd been drinking.  
"work ran late."  
"Was it all okay?" he asked, which meant "are you okay and do you need to talk about it." Sirius had no doubt that Remus would send his date home if Sirius had had a bad night.  
"Yeah no it was fine," Sirius said.  
Remus clearly wasn't that drunk, because all his speech was perfect, but he was swaying slightly and when Sirius affirmed his okay-ness, a smile melted onto his face. His swaying seemed to take on a blissful quality.  
"Oh!" Remus turned to his friend. "This is my flatmate."  
The guy gave a little wave, but turned to start at Remus' eyes intensely. For his part, Remus stared back and bit his lip. He took the man by the hand and pulled him towards his room, throwing a goodnight to Sirius before he shut the door.  
Okay, so Remus had a date. It was odd, because through all their time in this flat, neither of them had actually brought anyone home. Although that was probably just because they weren't out, not some sort of flatmate etiquette that Sirius had thought.  
Or hadn't thought, rather. in fact, until now he'd barely thought about them bringing guys home at all.

He went to bed pretty much as soon as Remus did. No point waiting up anymore. Just as he lay down a heard the soft voices from Remus' room get a little louder. They had the whole kitchen between their rooms, but the walls were so thin they could hear most anything above a murmur.  
which is how he heard the quiet moaning and a distinct grunt and found himself picturing his best friend in bed with a man.  
Merlin, why couldn't he have cast a silencing charm? Sirius thought. it was because the man was a muggle.  
When the moaning got louder Sirius cursed the gods. It was the perfect form of torture. He should absolutely not be thinking about his flatmate in compromising positions and he abso-fucking-lutely should getting turned on by it. Maybe if he tried, he could block it out? But the longer they went on, the larger the evidence was that Sirius could simply not ignore it. Couldn't Ignore the hoarse groans and the keening. Couldn't ignore the thought of Remus naked and blushing and hot, fucking some guy two rooms away.

He cast a muffling charm in his room, to hush the sounds at least. He couldn't cast a silencing charm on Remus' room, because they'd both made their rooms spell proof from the outside. If you asked them, they'd tell you it was for protection. there's a war on and you can't be too cautious. It was actually following a huge prank war a few months ago that they got this encryption, though that's irrelevant. It bit him now though, as Sirius was forced to listen for what would be a very long night.  
He cursed Remus for costing him precious sleep. Did he genuinely care? not really. not in that way  
Truth be told, Sirius did contemplate taking half an hour. Skipping straight past the torture. But taking anything more than 20 minutes gave him fainting spells and migraines and whatever the fuck else they hadn't yet discovered. this may be excruciating, but the side effects of Time could feel like death. Sirius was a busy man. he had to be up by 6am. He simply didn't have time for death.

So he endured the thoughts of Moony exposed under the glow of the streetlights, balls deep in passion and the stranger he brought home. Sirius had seen Remus naked countless times, but not like that.  
Never like that.  
And his chest (oh god his chest) felt like it was caving in from the pressure of some awful feeling he couldn't determine. But he knew the truth of the cause was far less mystical than he'd hope to insist. His entire problem with the night boiled down to one fact: Remus wasn't fucking _him_.


	3. Chapter 3

The table was round and the Order sat around it in a room too small to comfortably hold them all.  
James and Lily were reporting back on a mission they'd been on, but with no new information. No one seemed to be getting any new information lately. If Sirius didn't trust Dumbledore so much, he'd wonder if the old man really knew what he was doing.  
Instead they sat and pretended that the lack of info wasn’t completely disheartening and that this room was just as overcrowded as it had been 6 months ago. It's hard to find comfort it blatant lies, and yet what else can one do? They had to keep pushing on, losing was not an option.  
The path of righteousness should always prevail but this felt less certain than it had when they left Hogwarts.

And then Dumbledore spoke. He had an announcement of grave news, he'd said, of the sort that was surely bad but unknown in its technicalities. Prewet and Longbottom had run into some Death Eaters. the team they were leading outnumbered the Death Eaters, and they were sure they'd win the fight (they had Marlene on their side, after all) but as they cornered in, the Death Eaters disappeared into thin air.  
"They hadn’t apparated or anything; they just disappeared. It was almost like they'd never been there at all."  
Too quick to register, they were saying. Felt like a dream, where everything changes instantly but you can’t recall what it used to be in relation to reality. "Like they'd slipped out of time."  
Shit  
Dumbledore said that he had no idea what this new magic the Death Eaters were using was, but he warned them of its danger. "If they can dissolve like that without warning, we know not the limits of what they can do." There’s no warning like with apparition, see: no sound. And no way to trace it or follow, either.  
"It’s dangerous largely because it’s so unbridled." They couldn’t argue with that.

Sirius glanced at Remus, taking extra care to be subtle.  
Sirius Black was a lot of things, but subtle had never famously been one of them.  
He kicked him under the table for good measure. Moony gave him a look. Moony's look was far subtler. it said fuck.  
The rest of that meeting dragged like hell. Every tick of the clock punched through Sirius' skull. People's words and worry grabbed his heart and twisted; tighter, tighter. The silence between crawled through his ears and sat in his brain. it made a home and it rapidly rot. the absence of noise is louder than the eardrum can hope to bare. That's why Sirius was always determined to fill it with jokes or songs or anything.  
The order was in danger. Their Fault. His fault. That's a worry. Big worry. He endangered his friends without thinking. Again. Always a Black. Always a Black.

He pulled Remus around the corner and apparated back to their flat. Then they started yelling without any force but frustration and fear.  
"What the hell are we gonna do?" He asked Remus.  
"Christ. I have no fucking clue." Remus pushed a frantic hand through his hair. "No fucking clue."  
They walked and they paced and they yelled and they worried and worried and worried.  
"We've gotta stop them." Sirius was referring to the Death Eaters.  
"Before the ministry finds out." The order too, because they could be seen as traitors and terrorists. The ministry was not famous for their fair trials. Sirius would do anything to stay out of Azkaban.  
"Could we track the people we've sold to?" He asked.  
"Not unless we know who we've actually dealt to, which is kinda the whole problem."  
"Don’t be a dick, I'm trying to help."  
"mm, sorry."  
"we should have put a spoor in the Time." They shouldn't have, Sirius knew, and they didn't to stop it being tacked to them. Still.  
"Maybe we can trace it anyway." Remus said. "A reforming spell and a tracer on the shit we haven’t sold 'd work, right?"  
"I think so, do you know how to do it?"  
"No, I can find out though"  
"Okay. Okay," Sirius repeated. "It’s going to be okay."  
A loud crack echoed through their apartment.  
Two very angry people appeared; a redhead whose face was almost matching her hair, and a desi man whose rage threatened to throw the glasses clean of his face.  
"What the ever-loving fuck is going on?" Lily demanded.  
Sirius and Moony looked at each other and then at Lily. When it became clear they weren't going to offer any clarification, James spoke up.  
"You have something to do with the new Death Eater information, don’t you?"  
"Wait, how could you tell?" Sirius asked, his anxiety amplifying exponentially at the fear of discovery.  
"Because we've been together since we were 11. I know every single one of your facial expressions, both of you, and your glances in the meeting stank of guilt."  
"I, uh, we," Remus started. "We started selling time."  
"what the fuck?"  
"We made physical time, and we sold it. It lets you either skip or stop time," Sirius explained.  
"Is that even legal?" Lily asked.  
"Well, it’s not illegal, yet," Remus said.  
Lily did not like that answer. "Merlin," she said, "are you trying to get yourselves locked up?"  
Sirius sensed that was rhetorical.  
"Why did you sell it to death eaters?" James sounded hurt.  
"We didn’t know we were."  
"You guys are so bloody stupid sometimes."  
"Hey," Remus said. "We didn’t have much choice; we were starving and almost homeless. It's not like we did it for fun."  
Sirius knew their friends had picked up on their money troubles, and that they'd lost weight, but clearly, they didn’t know the extent of it.  
"Anyway, we’re gonna sort it. We've got a plan," said Sirius.  
"We got here 5 minutes after you did, how good a plan is it?" James asked. He was familiar with the consequences of their shitty plans.  
"It's enough. We'll track the Time that’s out there, and we'll go from that," said Remus.  
"God, okay," Lily conceded. "Just be careful, alright?"  
Sirius nodded. "I don’t know how long this'll take. Can you cover for us at the Order?"  
"Always," Prongs said.

***

their fire escape looked out over London but sat on it they peered down at a map. It was weighed down in the corners by two mugs, and apple, and a can of baked beans, because apparently Remus only thought to grab objects from the kitchen. The wind sliced at their extremities.  
Where they were on the map, Sirius put a smear of time which was paired to the chunk Remus was levitating over the railing edge.  
"Here goes," he said. "Vanesco Vestigium."  
The time melted through cracks in the great plain of existence, leaving as it went swirls of iridescent that gave a paradoxically omnipresent impression. It was like fairy dust.  
"How long will it take?" He asked.  
"Let's give it an hour, if it hasn't worked by then we'll try something else," Remus said.  
"Can you believe this happened?"  
"it’s not the most unlikely thing. I didn't see it coming either."  
they were 5 stories high so they could see the sprawling streets but not over the roves of the neighbouring flats. it was a shame because the intricacy of a city is as beautiful as nature can be. especially at night, with the lights like stars and the roads like veins.  
You can seem so insignificant in a city because it’s so full on life and lives. Your life is as small as those windows in the skyscrapers lit against the sky. But the city is nothing without all that life.  
"It's working!" Remus said suddenly. Sirius looked at the map. the splodge of time he'd smeared in the middle was gone, but dots had started to appear in the area around it. "Those'll be the ones closest to us. If there's a significant amount shown somewhere we'll check that out first."  
Sirius smiled. Their fuck up was beginning to fuck down.

Silence stretched like the city, comfortable and alive.  
"Moony?"  
"Mm?" Remus didn't look away from the skyline.  
"I'm gay."  
Now he did. "Wait, really?"  
Sirius laughed nervously. "That's why I was to weird the other week."  
"Shit," Remus said and laughed to himself.  
"What?"  
"Huh? oh nothing." And then he laughed again, differently this time. "We were both gay, all this time, and we didn't realise."  
"I know," Sirius laughed too.  
"I can't believe Prongs never accidentally let it slip."  
"Well, to be fair, I bet he would have if he knew."  
"Wait, you haven't told James?"  
"Never told anyone."  
"Wow, then thanks for trusting me."  
Sirius felt lighter, somehow. And nervous. He thought it'd be bigger. He thought something would happen, maybe. Not sure what but, well, something.  
Remus was looking at him funny. He couldn’t decode his facial expression, but the glow of the city struck his cheekbones. It reflected in the beautiful eyes that were trained on Sirius.  
"I never told you why I left home."  
"I thought it was because of the pureblood supremacy and your arsehole family?"  
"Well, it was but I mean, why then, exactly. I didn't choose to leave."  
"Wait, what?"  
"I got kicked out. My parents, uh, found out. That I'm gay, I mean."  
Remus moved closer to Sirius, so they were pressed against each other. "God, I'm sorry, Pads."  
Sirius laughed without meaning, but he leaned into Remus' side. "Yeah."  
Physical contact was the way they'd always done this. Comfort is easier through touch than through words.  
"That's why you never told anyone you're gay?"  
"Mmh." And then he laughed. "Well, some guys you don't really need to tell."  
Remus laughed at that too. Proper laughed, head thrown up and everything. He squeezed Sirius' side.  
Ah. Sirius felt the Something.

"Hey Padfoot, look at this. There's a shitton of time here. Tomorrow we should work out what's down there." Remus pointed to a large iridescent splodge on the map.  
"No need," Sirius said. "It's my parent's house."

***

Sirius hadn't been back there since he was 16. he never thought he would.  
The sky pressed heavy and low like it was full and angry and Sirius knew how it felt. His head was full of clouds.

"You can wait outside to keep lookout and give me info," Remus had said. He didn't want to force Sirius back into his childhood home, but Sirius wouldn't settle for anything less than joining him.  
"We do this together," he'd say, because it was their mess and their solution. Both of theirs.  
"I mean it, Padfoot," Remus said - he'd long omitted the word serious from his vocabulary.  
And Sirius would glare at him to tell him to shut up, so Remus would then shut up and go back to shoving various supplies into a beaten duffel bag. They'd spent two days planning this mission to eliminate as many loose variables as possible. All equipment had a purpose, though you'd wonder why Remus was trying to pack all their cutlery if you weren't aware of the nuances of the plan.

He just stood there for a minute, breathing the moody air deeply into his lungs. Exhaling like cigarette smoke. He felt a hand on his shoulder.  
"You okay?" Remus asked.  
"Yeah, let's get this over with."  
Remus nodded, and gave him the niffler. "Everything else is ready," he said.  
"Here goes nothing." Sirius released the niffler on the floor, and watched it run towards 12 Grimmauld Place.  
The two men waited until the animal was on the front lawn before running down the side passage. Nifflers, being magical animals, should be enough to set off the alarm wards around the house. The others could be dismantled easily enough without alert. Shows of extraordinary decadence littering the features of the house for once worked against the Ancient and Most Prestigious House of Black. The excessive gold and silver trim was a niffler's free sweetshop.  
Sirius took down the wards from the passage because he knew them in a way Remus never could. That would be the only magic they could use for the imminent future, because the niffler cover could only work for about a minute. Anything else now would set the alarms off again. If they were gonna do this, it would have to be like muggles.

They stood below Sirius' window. Time was precious for this part; they were visible from several downstairs windows. As nuanced as they liked to think of their plan, this part was rather preschool.  
Sirius climbed on Remus' shoulders, who braced himself against the wall to let Sirius get up even higher. The shorter man stood up fully on his shoulders, wobbling like a bastard, to jimmy open the windows. They were old; single glazed, worn wooden frames, track marks still visible from where Sirius forced them open in his childhood. That made it easier to get one open. He couldn’t reach the top of the frames to tie the rope to like he'd hoped, but he managed to hook it round the lowest hinges.  
Remus pulled himself up the rope after Sirius had pushed himself into the room. The boy wasn't exactly lanky, but werewolf strength was deceiving.

His room had barely changed since he left home. He wasn't exactly surprised that they hadn’t repurposed his room; they had enough to spare. Sure, they'd stripped out the furniture, but the walls and carpet were the same. His faded quidditch posters still hung over where his bed was, his carpet was still stained from when he tried to dye his hair purple. The burn marks still littered around.  
The singes from the hexes.

The big one, by the door, was from the summer before 5th year. Walburga was hosting a dinner for affluent pureblood families; not unusual. Starters were served with a side of berating Sirius for his Gryffindor blood traitor status, his friends, his appearance. By all accounts, Sirius was a disappointment.  
He wouldn’t let it hurt him. (it did).  
Narcissa and Lucius talked about how hopelessly in love they were. They weren't; their engagement was arranged about a month prior, though the eagerness to continue the bloodline seemed worryingly genuine. Sirius hoped he'd escape before he got forced to marry a girl he could never love.  
"It’s just wonderful to know your marriage will be so pure," one of the Malfoys said. "Too many respectable wizards these days are throwing out purity for mud."  
And that was when Sirius had enough. Every time it got him nowhere, but every time he had to try. "It’s better to be 'impure' than a bigot," he sneered.  
Thunder hit the table. Walburga slammed it with her fists. She put him under a silencing spell, but Sirius knew from experience and the fire in her eyes that worse was coming.  
That "worse" was a hex so blindingly painful that Sirius could do nothing but lay unmoving for hours. It hit him once the guests left, the second he returned to his room. there was no remorse in his mother's eyes, just disgust. Sirius' father stood and moved. There wasn’t a single expression on his face, but he stood by as his son writhed in pain, still forcibly silenced.

Sirius was in his old room. Remus was behind him, he knew that. And he could see the walls and out the window but at the same time all he could see was the flash of the hexes. All he could feel was the pain.  
He was 15 again, staring down the line of his parent's wand.  
He was 12, he was 11, 9, 8, 7.  
He was scared.  
God the fear.  
It’s all consuming and there’s no way out and it crushes you, merlin it crushes him.  
And he can’t see because he can’t breathe because all he can think is the jerk of the arm and the flash of light and the pain and the guilt. And the walls are caving in now; he's on the floor and he should be moving but he can’t move because he can’t stop thinking because he's 9 again and he's terrified.  
it’s too much.  
Too much.  
And then

He felt something. A body. Remus' body, pressed up against him; hugging him tightly and swaying.  
"It’s okay it’s okay it’s okay," he was saying to Sirius, who realised he'd been crying. Only a few minutes had passed, but Sirius was exhausted. He hadn't had an attack like that since the year after he moved out.  
"I'm sorry," Sirius said when he could speak again.  
"It's okay," said Moony.

***

“Hey lily,” Peter said. “Have you seen Padfoot or Moony? I stopped by their flat but they weren’t in.”  
“Uh, yeah. They were just here a few hours ago,” she said. “They were, uh-”  
“They were picking up a hangover draught,” James supplied.  
“Oh. okay,” Pete said. “Where are they now?”  
“Sirius had a one night stand last night and they’re, uh, trying to track down the girl. Who neither of them remember,” said Lily.  
“Because they were drunk,” said James. “Hence the hangovers.”  
“You’re mad, Prongs. Okay, well, I better get back to work. If u see them again, tell them I’ll give Sirius his jacket back when I next see him.”  
James and Lily looked at each other.  
“That didn’t go well,” he said. “We need to have a better story next time.”

“Lily Potter,” Moody said through the floo.  
“Moody.”  
“Lupin and Black haven’t shown up at their order duties for the last two days. What’s going on?”  
“Remus’ mum’s not well, sir,” she said.  
“Yeah,” James chipped in. “She’s dying. Remus is distraught. Gone properly off the grid and everything. Not even using magic, sir.”  
“Sirius has gone with him, to be there for him. I don’t think either of them can be tracked, because of how off the grid they’ve gone.”  
“It’s probably not even worth trying. They’ll probably be back by the day after tomorrow.”  
“Condolences,” Moody said, “but they need to check in with the Order”

“How is this working?” Lily asked James a while later.  
“I dunno. We’ve told at least 4 slightly different stories by now. We’re not even very good at this.”  
“To be fair, I never trained for this. A year ago, I thought that right now I’d be training to be a healer. I didn’t factor ‘covering for our idiot friends because they accidentally dealt weapons to wizard Nazis’ into my plan.”  
“Yeah. That’s fair.”

***  
They were ready for the next stage. Sirius had come down almost as completely as he'd spiralled.  
Remus was crouched next to the door with a magnet. They'd practised this part several times at home yesterday.  
He rolled a marble sized metal thing gently under the door. It was a small explosive, and as soon as it was under the door, Remus used the magnet to roll it up the wooden surface. He had his head pressed against the door, trying to hear the explosive moving, his face a picture of beautiful concentration.  
The door couldn’t be picked or charmed open from the inside, a feature Sirius' parents had installed a during 3rd year. They had to attack it from the outside, without magic.  
"I think it’s in position," Remus spoke softly. Sirius nodded.  
They were waiting for their cover, which was on a timer. Remus'd factored in plenty of time for getting this bit ready, because if it didn’t work they were fucked. Assuming they weren't fucked regardless.  
And with that, Sirius heard a light tinkle, like the distinct sound of a fork falling off a roof.  
He held up three fingers, and mouthed to Remus: "3... 2.. 1."  
Remus tapped the door sharply to activate the explosive. just before the audible bang gave away their position, there was an almighty crash. It was a sound like no other. 12 sets of mismatched cutleries hit the floor from a 3-story drop, along with several saucepans, a vase that Sirius always hated, and dislodged rooftiles. The fireworks were the best part of the noise for sure; they exploded at ridiculous volume because they were the stupid homemade ones that couldn’t even be used for guy Fawkes night 'cause they had barely any colour. Turns out failed chemistry attempts could be useful after all. It could have been beautiful, their cacophony of crashes, but it was a piercing orchestra that only hurt their ears.  
It should have covered their little explosion.

The door was open, but now they had to move quickly. Anyone in the house would know something was happening. A niffler could be excused - they had one try its luck at the guiding every few years Sirius lived there - but an explosion is harder to chalk up to nature.  
This bit was the hard bit. They'd planned everything up 'til now. But they had no way of knowing which room the time was in, nor who was in the house. Judging by the nature of the house as a storage place, they assumed there'd be a fair amount of Death Eaters.

 

As they stepped out into the hallway, a weird feeling hit Sirius. He’d assumed it was just the memories affecting him before, but here it was stronger. A look from Remus let him know he felt it too. The house felt like moving through a dream. Time seemed to move irregularly in an almost imperceptible way; one moment you pushed against gravy to move in the slightest, and it was still too slow, and less than a split second later, time would speed up.  
That was a good sign. Or bad, depending on how you looked at it. Sirius and Remus had never stored much time in their flat, preferring to sell each batch before restoring its quantity, but Sirius felt that this feeling must be the result of vast amounts stored here. It was too similar to the experience of moving through frozen time, only this was unpredictable and distressing.

He burst through to the parlour. Technically he didn't have to run, but some of life calls for all or nothing. Neither Walburga nor Orion were in the room, and although Sirius didn’t realise he’d been hoping for their absence, he found himself immensely grateful. Facing them was not on his list for today. The fact of their absence signified something big, he thought. It wasn’t just for anyone that the Blacks would give up their house for storage or meeting or whatever the fuck was going on here.  
The room wasn't empty. It didn’t have what Sirius was looking for either. He stared into the face of a man he vaguely recognised from Hogwarts. Three other people gaped at him for a moment. It was a long moment, it seemed, before they all pulled out their wands.  
“Stupefy,” Sirius spat at the first guy, narrowly dodging a hex from the tall woman as he sprinted back into the hallway. He set the door on fire as he went. That should keep them a bit longer.  
“Sirius!” He heard Remus yell from down the hall. He rushed into the dining room, where Moony was calling him. Every step he took, the strange dreamlike feeling intensified. It was harder to control.  
In the far corner of the room sat a pile of time big enough to realise Sirius the extent of the situation. That was over half of what they’d even created. Probably 9 months, all in all. Merlin, what Voldemort’s army could do in that time, he shuddered to think.  
Remus was trying to duel three people, and doing so surprisingly well. Two of them were Sirius’ cousins, the other was Malfoy. He wasn’t winning, not by a long shot, but he was holding up. Colours flashed across the room over and over as they danced and dodged and Sirius jinxed one guy to the floor while he wasn’t looking. Remus grinned at him briefly before ducking out the way of a spell. It shot past his ear and exploded the cabinet behind him.  
The door flew open behind Sirius, and two of the people from the other room rushed in. Presumably, the others were fetching help or putting out the fire. They rushed forward, curses on their tongues.  
A shot. Another one.  
Sirius threw a vicious bat bogey hex at the ginger man fighting him. In seconds, his back froze over and he buckled in pain. His vision started swimming. He had no idea what he’d been hit with. Something blue washed over the space above him, just as the women he didn’t know threw a curse at him. It hit the blue and exploded. Oh. It was a shielding spell from  
“Moony!” he yelled, as his friend failed to see the man on the floor getting back up with a spell aimed straight at his face. They were hilariously outnumbered. It was hilarious only in the sense that it couldn’t be real, but somehow it was.  
“The mission,” Remus roared back. “Go!”  
Sirius ran towards the time. He got hit in the back again, and face planted the floor. No time to recover. Got to get back up.  
He ran again, blindly shooting curses behind him, praying to every god he might ever believe in that none of them would hit Remus.  
“Cousin,” Malfoy said, smiling down at him. They weren’t even proper cousins. Sirius went to hex him first, but he disarmed him with only a flick of his wand.  
They were always better at cursing first, at thinking after irreversible actions, his family. But Sirius wasn’t done. He rocked back, and punched him square in the throat. Lucius buckled over.  
Remus had backed over to Sirius now, finding it easier to defend them both when working from a single angle. He’d given up on duelling - he was clearly just buying time against the four advanced wizards. Trying not to die. Always trying not to die.  
They yelled and they swung and the walls shook as everything exploded. Remus had blood streaming down the side of his face. Sirius couldn't feel his own left arm.  
And then there was a moment where time slowed down again, but it had little to do with the heavy spell of the time. Remus was blocking a cruciatus curse that arced down at him from Narcissa’s wand. He didn’t see the flash of green that smeared itself against Sirius’ eyelids for days to come.  
“AVADA KADAVRA,” the ginger man had roared. The spell moved so quickly. Remus didn’t look up until it was already shooting towards him. The man had known tragedy from a young age. He always knew he would die young. It didn’t make the immense hurt any less.  
Sirius spun round. There was screaming in his ears. It might have been him screaming. He plunged his hand into the pile of time as he went, and slammed it straight into Remus’ back.

Time froze.

The killing curse was mere inches from Moony’s face. Inches. That’s far too close for a 19-year-old to have to come. But there was a war on, and they made a lot of mistakes, like selling time as an accidental weapon of the enemy, so it was more common than it should have been.  
Sirius crashed his body against Moony’s. They were both laughing and crying and they clung to each other, forgetting the battle scene all around them. They would never let go.  
They did, though. Let go. Remus went up to the time, with Sirius in tow. They had to do this together, like they’d started it. Not for symbolism; for practicality of the spell.  
Remus pointed his wand at it, trembling slightly, and whispered “tenua aevum”, while Sirius said “finite incantatem.” Much like the other night, it burst into nothing, slipping through the ether in a trail of iridescent whirls. It was better than fireworks. More beautiful than a sunrise. The most beautiful thing in the room? No, not quite.  
There’d be repercussions for what they’d done. Almost definitely. Unless…

“Obliviate.”

***

“How long do we have left?” Remus asked.  
“I don’t know. I just grabbed a chunk.”  
They were lying on the roof of their building. They’d apparated up here after removing the traces of themselves from Grimmauld Place. It was dark enough to pretend they could see the stars past the orange glow of the light pollution. The sky felt warm and Sirius’ chest felt light.  
They were okay. They were okay.  
Remus took Sirius’ fag from his hand and finished it. His smoke blew a long column into the sky. They were part of the sky, up here. The sky was beautiful and limitless and so were they.  
“Hey, Moony?”  
“Yeah?”  
“Can I kiss you?”  
Remus smiled then. Big and bold; the kind that reached his eyes and made him look like an angel walking on earth. An angel on the rooftop. He propped himself up on one arm, and they kissed.  
This is it.  
Sometimes, a moment is so pristine that it feels as if life was leading up to this moment. The kiss was far from perfect, but the messiness is what made it perfect too. Everything slotted into place. Sirius knew without a shadow of a doubt that he loved Remus. Totally and irrevocably. That confession could wait for another day.  
Remus was a good kisser. Their lips crashed and tongues slipped over each other’s. His body pressed down over Sirius’ own, hard lines of muscle and soft flesh holding him in the moment. His mouth tasted of wet. That was a good thing, somehow.  
It was amazing. It wasn’t enough. It was all Sirius would ever need.  
They broke apart, eventually. Remus rolled off Sirius, but they stayed nestled against each other. They’d done this a thousand times before, but this time it was better. It was complete.  
“You have no idea how long I’ve been wanting to do that,” Remus said.  
“Wait, you?” Sirius laughed. “I’ve fancied you since we were in Hogwarts.”  
Remus joined in. “So, we could have been doing this for years?”  
It felt right though, now. Everything felt right.  
“It doesn’t feel like time; it feels like a different place entirely,” Sirius said.  
“It’d be nice to live here,” Remus said. “Occasionally. I feel like this is a place where we can breathe.”  
“One where we aren’t running away,” Sirius said.  
“That’s funny, because this is closer to running from time than we could ever get in reality.”  
“And this isn't reality?”  
Remus rolled over, their noses moments apart. His thumb stroked Sirius’ cheek.  
“Nah,” Remus said. “Too good to be.”

And so they kissed.


End file.
